UCLA hosts conference on Armenian Genocide

The Armenian Genocide means that Aleksan Giragosian cannot visit churches that were hundreds of years old or visit a mountain that is a symbol of Armenian nationalism.

The law and public policy graduate student said he cannot visit the historical sites that he wants to because the buildings have been vandalized and started to decay in the years following the genocide. Mount Ararat, the mountain where Noah’s ark landed by Judeo-Christian tradition, is visible from Armenia’s capital but is located in Turkey, which makes it inaccessible.

He said he thinks the loss of cultural sites has seriously damaged his connection to Armenian culture.

“Imagine if Leonardo Da Vinci had been killed and someone burned down the Basilica,” Giragosian said. “What would that have done to Italian culture?”

One way Giragosian commemorated the 100th anniversary of the genocide this year, which is officially honored on April 24, was by attending a conference at UCLA.

The conference took place at the UCLA Faculty Center Friday and Saturday. Sebouh D. Aslanian, a history professor, said he organized the conference to embed the Armenian Genocide in the context of global history.

Each day of the conference had three panels where professors presented their papers on topics including Armenian-Turkish relations after the genocide and the reactionof the U.S. to the genocide as it happened. Speakers came from UCLA and other colleges including USC, Stanford and Harvard.

The Armenian Genocide took place in parts of the Ottoman Empire in 1915.The Young Turks, the ruling party that overthrew the old Sultan, targeted the minority Armenian population during World War I because the party claimed the Armenian community was cooperating with the Russians. ...